Great Sex, Naturally by Dr. Laurie Steelsmith

Author:Dr. Laurie Steelsmith
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hay House, Inc.
Published: 2012-07-16T16:00:00+00:00

Herbs, Nutrition, and Foods to Mitigate Midlife Symptoms and Support Libido

If you’re seeking relief from menopausal symptoms, including low libido, you want to begin with the gentlest, weakest, and most conservative measures you can, and gradually move to stronger treatments only if needed. Like some women, you may have low libido but sufficient or borderline hormone levels. These gentle approaches may effectively reduce or eliminate your symptoms, and you may never need any other treatment.

Conventional doctors often jump to the conclusion that if you have menopausal symptoms and a lowered sex drive, you need hormone replacement therapy, largely because their training doesn’t adequately prepare them to explore your other options. Hormone replacement therapy has far more potential side effects than other approaches, and it’s preferable for your overall health and sexuality if you can avoid them. The following are your best “first line of defense” options for treating menopausal symptoms naturally and gently:

—Black cohosh. The herb black cohosh has long been used to alleviate symptoms associated with menopause, including hot flashes, night sweats, depression, and (as you saw earlier in this book) vaginal atrophy and dryness. Research shows that black cohosh is safe and can be taken for an extended period of time, or until it’s no longer necessary for controlling midlife symptoms. It reduces hot flashes by affecting your estrogen receptors, but doesn’t actually increase your estrogen level; this makes it a good choice if you have a family history, or personal history, of estrogen-related cancer. A study published in the journal Gynecological Endocrinology in 2011 found that black cohosh can also help menopausal women who take the drug tamoxifen (often prescribed after breast-cancer diagnoses to prevent future recurrences). Tamoxifen can aggravate menopausal symptoms, but women who took black cohosh in addition had fewer hot flashes, less anxiety, and improved sleep. The recommended dose of black cohosh for reducing symptoms of menopause is 80 mg taken twice daily.

—Maca. A powerful Peruvian herb, maca contains plant sterols that have the ability to strengthen your entire hormonal system. Maca is effective in treating menopausal symptoms of hot flashes, night sweats, and insomnia because it can stimulate your glands to increase their production of estrogen and other hormones—which makes it a valuable alternative to hormone replacement therapy. Maca has other benefits as well: it supports your adrenal glands, helps lower your stress-hormone level, and increases your sex drive. (It also increases male libido, as you’ll discover later in this book.) The recommended dose for menopausal symptoms is 1,000 mg twice daily.

—Da Bu Yin. Da Bu Yin is one of the best Chinese herbal formulas for treating menopausal symptoms related to a deficiency of yin, which typically include night sweats, insomnia, hot flashes, anxiety, and increased thirst. The herbs in Da Bu Yin have been used for thousands of years and have no known side effects. The recommended dose of one Da Bu Yin product, called Great Yin (see Appendix C), is two to three pills three times daily.

—Two Immortals. Also known as

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